![thedailywhat:
More On Kony 2012: If this past week has taught us anything, it’s that people love — love — being aware of things. More than that, they love telling other people that they are aware of things. Most of all, however, people are absolutely, unconditionally, head over heels in lifelong love with other people liking the fact that they are aware of things.
But why do people love being aware of things as much as they do? In a 2008 blog post, Stuff White People Like attempted to get to the core of the Western world’s codependent relationship with awareness. By raising awareness, wrote Christian Lander, ”you get all the benefits of helping (self satisfaction, telling other people), but no need for difficult decisions or the ensuing criticism (how do you criticize awareness?).”
Of course, what makes awareness so alluring is precisely what makes it so pointless: It doesn’t — in and of itself — actually accomplish anything.
Awareness, beyond argument, is the first step towards fixing a problem. But, invariably, that shared endorphin boost people experience when banding together to rally around awareness for a cause wears off, and all that’s left is a bunch of people with no answers looking around for someone — anyone — to take the next step.
And then someone does. And we pat them on the back for their willingness to put in the elbow grease and leg work necessary to actually get something done. And we happily sign their petitions or open our wallets to them: After all, it’s the least we can do to help this selfless do-gooder advance our cause beyond awareness. And we send them on their way, content in the thought that, if we couldn’t spare the time, at least we could spare a few dollars and a signature.
But what if that person, or that organization, we just bankrolled doesn’t understand the problem or what needs to be done about it? What if, instead of helping, their actions end up hurting not only the people they claim to want to help, but also the people who are actually helping? And, perhaps most importantly, what if the people supposedly being helped don’t want help? Should it still be foisted upon them against their will?
Take KONY 2012 for example.
A lot has been said over the last several days about Invisible Children’s ultra-viral awareness campaign that targets infamous central African warlord Joseph Kony, and his 26-year-old rebel militia, the Lord’s Resistance Army.
IC’s finances have been called into question; their “emotional porn” approach toward awareness solicitation has been criticised as a “fund-raising stunt” which employs “blatant dishonesty” in an effort to perpetuate “myths” about Kony thereby achieving their stated goal of direct military intervention; the group’s leadership troika — seen above posing in 2008 with members of the then-child-soldier-recruiting Sudan People’s Liberation Army — has been referred to as self-promoting colonialists by the AP photographer who snapped the shot. But, through all the op-eds and the think pieces and the public polls, the only opinions worth heeding have remained largely invisible: Those of the people who are actually from there.
“[Invisible Children] are not known as a peace building organization and I do not think they have experience with peace building and conflict resolution methods,” wrote Anywar Ricky Richard, the director of the northern Ugandan organization Friends of Orphans, and a man who knows first-hand the horrors of the Lord’s Resistance Army, having been a former child soldier in its service. “I totally disagree with their approach of military action as a means to end this conflict.”
Ugandan-born activist TMS Ruge, co-founder of Project Diaspora, agrees wholeheartedly with Richard. Of KONY 2012 he says: “It is a slap in the face to so many of us who want to rise from the ashes of our tumultuous past and the noose of benevolent, paternalistic, aid-driven development memes.”
Indeed, in the rush to condescend to the central Africans who are “just not working hard enough” to get rid of Kony and his ilk and finally start improving their quality of life, what many overlook (or willfully ignore) is the already-visible progress that has been made thanks to the hard-earned grassroots efforts of central Africans themselves.
“Uganda was voted by Lonely Planet amongst the top destinations for 2012 but has this NGO just undone the potential for Uganda’s tourism?” asks Ida Horner, a Ugandan expat who remembers well a much harsher life under Idi Amin. “After all the tourism industry provides a real opportunity for Ugandans to work their way out of poverty through providing services that tourists want to consume.”
Nigerian-American novelist Teju Cole takes it a step further and slams what he calls the “White Savior Industrial Complex,” which cares little for the end, so long as it gets satisfaction from the means. “The white savior supports brutal policies in the morning, founds charities in the afternoon, and receives awards in the evening,” says Cole. “The White Savior Industrial Complex is not about justice. It is about having a big emotional experience that validates privilege.”
And all this before we’ve even touched on the dark heart of the matter: Joseph Kony.
Kony is, without a doubt, a despicable human being. His 25-year reign of terror has resulted in hundreds of deaths, thousands of abductions, and hundreds of thousands of displacements. But to suggest that Kony is anywhere near worthy of cheap, throwaway comparisons to such historical horror-mongers as Hitler is not only irresponsible, it might actually be what Kony wants.
IC’s video appears to suggest that Kony is currently in possession of over 30,000 child soldiers. According to the UN’s latest report, the LRA has “less than 500 combatants,” and was “dislodged” by Ugandan security forces in 2002 — meaning they are no longer there, and are unlikely to return.
Kony and the LRA are now but a horrible memory to many in northern Uganda who don’t need an Internet campaign to make Kony popular. They know all-too-well who he is and what he was once capable of, and are desperately trying — peacefully, through reconciliation — to move away from the shadows of their traumatic past.
“Now we have peace, people are back in their homes,” says Dr. Beatrice Mpora, who runs a community health organization in the rebels’ former northern Uganda stomping ground of Gulu. “They are planting their fields, they are starting their businesses. That is what people should help us with.”
That is not to say that Kony is entirely done away with; he is still able to menace remote areas in neighboring countries such as the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Central African Republic — his last known hideout. But rather than an ascending fuhrer, Kony is an aging monster, thrashing about blindly in hopes of remaining relevant for a little while longer.
Sadly, it seems IC’s KONY 2012 campaign may end up doing exactly what it aims to do: Provide a spent villain with a second wind of infamy.
“Most madmen love the idea of fame,” says Marc DuBois of Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders), “so Joseph Kony’s wet dream just came true.” By focusing all available attention on a bygone bogeyman whose days are numbered, the IC may be unwittingly rejuvenating the perception of Kony as an intimidating and influential force with a wider reach than his true resources allow.
“Making Kony ‘famous’ could make him stronger,” says well-respected Ugandan blogger Javie Ssozi. And that strength puts a lot of people in danger, including both locals and aid workers such as DuBois and colleague Avril Benoît. “MSF teams in LRA-affected regions of DR Congo, Central African Republic & South Sudan are likely wary of retaliation risks,” said Benoît.
IC, with its support for direct military intervention in Uganda, may not care that Uganda’s own government considers it “totally misleading to suggest that the war is still in Uganda,” but Kony does. To him, KONY 2012 represents a rebirth — a chance to restore a stifling grip that has been slipping for years.
So say KONY 2012 succeeds. America plants even more bootprints on the ground, smokes Kony out of his cave, and turns him over to the International Criminal Court. A job well done and stogies all around. Now there’s just the small matter of the fact that nothing has actually changed, because KONY 2012 doesn’t do a lick to address any of the big-picture problems currently facing central Africa.
All it has succeeded in doing is propping up Uganda’s war-crimes-perpetrating military and its brutal, corrupt, human-rights-abusing dictatorship, and strengthening the alliance of four-term-president Yoweri Museveni with his US counterpart at a time when a foothold in Uganda would be extremely advantageous to American oil interests.
Meanwhile, actual problems in need of actual solutions are being rendered inaudible by the beating of war drums.
Gulu, the Ugandan town ravaged by the LRA in a previous life is now home to the highest numbers of child prostitutes in Uganda, according to Ugandan journalist Angelo Izama. It also has unacceptably high rates of HIV/AIDS and hepatitis, even when compared to the rest of Africa. And the real bane of Ugandan children — the mysterious “Nodding Disease,” which has killed scores and debilitated hundreds — is no closer to a cure.
“Last year I went to Gulu, Uganda, where Invisible Children is based, and interviewed over 50 locals,” writes Columbia University student Amber Ha in an open letter to IC’s Jason Russell. “Every single person questioned Invisible Children’s legitimacy and intention.”
Adam Branch, a human rights advocate who has worked for years in northern Uganda, elaborates on what precisely has given so many people in the area pause:
The warmongering, the self-indulgence, the commercialization, the reductive and one-sided story they tell, their portrayal of Africans as helpless children in need of rescue by white Americans, and the fact that civilians in Uganda and central Africa may have to pay a steep price in their own lives so that a lot of young Americans can feel good about themselves, and a few can make good money.
By now it should be abundantly clear that KONY 2012 doesn’t offer a single enduring solution to any of the problems it pretends to want to fix. At the very least, it makes things worse. At the very most, it makes things much worse.
But beyond the reasons why lies a simple truth: Lasting change — the kind that makes people’s lives truly better — doesn’t come from awareness, or even from doing something: It comes from doing what needs to be done. And knowing what that is requires paying attention, listening to the victims, and understanding the whole story.
You’ll notice that I haven’t once mentioned money. There is plenty to say about IC’s accountability and transparency (or lack thereof) and the way it goes about spending the piles of cash it is making off KONY 2012 — and piles of cash are definitely being made considering the ubiquitous ”sold out” heraldic standards that popped up almost instantaneously next to the all-important “awareness swag” IC is hawking in conjunction with the video campaign — but that discussion is mostly moot.
IC is not a charity in the true sense of the word. It is a private interest group that allocates the overwhelming majority of its budget (nearly 70% in 2011) toward travel, compensation, administration, fundraising, making movies, and lobbying celebrities and congress [pdf] to support its central aim: Direct foreign military intervention in Africa.
Whether or not that is what IC should be spending its money on is a question best left to IC. The real question that you should be asking yourself is whether or not that is what you should be spending your money on.
It should be well-evident by now that KONY 2012 is a poorly thought-out and oversimplified campaign with shortsighted objectives that are detrimental to every relevant cause except making money. More than that, it is a campaign that is unwelcome by local civilians, politicians, experts, and humanitarian aid workers.
Asked about the video’s glossing over major aspects of regional history and culture, IC co-founder, and the star of KONY 2012, Jason Russell told the New York Times, “No one wants a boring documentary on Africa. Maybe we have to make it pop, and we have to make it cool. We view ourself as the Pixar of human rights stories.”
That’s great, except Africa is not a feel-good animated feature for the whole family. It is a real place with real people who would suffer real consequences if KONY 2012 succeeded in convincing well-meaning individuals that all it needs for a happy ending is to catch the “bad guy” with the help of American soldiers.
Africans deserve better than to be treated like two-dimensional Wacom sketches by a group of sensationalist jet-setters who — by their own admission — oversimplify the issues to sell their cause (and their bracelets). The people of Africa — nay, the people of everywhere — deserve real, long-lasting solutions; not quick-fix half-remedies that look good on Facebook.
There are plenty of ways to help without trampling all over self-determination. There are good, honest, transparent not-for-profits based in Africa that have been working for years to promote self-sufficiency through education, health services, rehabilitation, democracy-building initiatives, and myriad other programs that have resulted in empowering change. These organizations help the people help themselves without condescension or remote imperatives.
But don’t take my word for it: Do the research. Find a cause you support and make sure it is what it says it is, and, more importantly, that it helps the people it claims to help. Invisible Children and KONY 2012 do not meet that criterion, and for that reason, above all other reasons presented here and elsewhere, it should not be allowed to speak on their behalf.
[photo: scarlettlion.]](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m0sj75ROZ81qzpwi0o1_1280.jpg)
More On Kony 2012: If this past week has taught us anything, it’s that people love — love — being aware of things. More than that, they love telling other people that they are aware of things. Most of all, however, people are absolutely, unconditionally, head over heels in lifelong love with other people liking the fact that they are aware of things.
But why do people love being aware of things as much as they do? In a 2008 blog post, Stuff White People Like attempted to get to the core of the Western world’s codependent relationship with awareness. By raising awareness, wrote Christian Lander, ”you get all the benefits of helping (self satisfaction, telling other people), but no need for difficult decisions or the ensuing criticism (how do you criticize awareness?).”
Of course, what makes awareness so alluring is precisely what makes it so pointless: It doesn’t — in and of itself — actually accomplish anything.
Awareness, beyond argument, is the first step towards fixing a problem. But, invariably, that shared endorphin boost people experience when banding together to rally around awareness for a cause wears off, and all that’s left is a bunch of people with no answers looking around for someone — anyone — to take the next step.
And then someone does. And we pat them on the back for their willingness to put in the elbow grease and leg work necessary to actually get something done. And we happily sign their petitions or open our wallets to them: After all, it’s the least we can do to help this selfless do-gooder advance our cause beyond awareness. And we send them on their way, content in the thought that, if we couldn’t spare the time, at least we could spare a few dollars and a signature.
But what if that person, or that organization, we just bankrolled doesn’t understand the problem or what needs to be done about it? What if, instead of helping, their actions end up hurting not only the people they claim to want to help, but also the people who are actually helping? And, perhaps most importantly, what if the people supposedly being helped don’t want help? Should it still be foisted upon them against their will?
Take KONY 2012 for example.
A lot has been said over the last several days about Invisible Children’s ultra-viral awareness campaign that targets infamous central African warlord Joseph Kony, and his 26-year-old rebel militia, the Lord’s Resistance Army.
IC’s finances have been called into question; their “emotional porn” approach toward awareness solicitation has been criticised as a “fund-raising stunt” which employs “blatant dishonesty” in an effort to perpetuate “myths” about Kony thereby achieving their stated goal of direct military intervention; the group’s leadership troika — seen above posing in 2008 with members of the then-child-soldier-recruiting Sudan People’s Liberation Army — has been referred to as self-promoting colonialists by the AP photographer who snapped the shot. But, through all the op-eds and the think pieces and the public polls, the only opinions worth heeding have remained largely invisible: Those of the people who are actually from there.
“[Invisible Children] are not known as a peace building organization and I do not think they have experience with peace building and conflict resolution methods,” wrote Anywar Ricky Richard, the director of the northern Ugandan organization Friends of Orphans, and a man who knows first-hand the horrors of the Lord’s Resistance Army, having been a former child soldier in its service. “I totally disagree with their approach of military action as a means to end this conflict.”
Ugandan-born activist TMS Ruge, co-founder of Project Diaspora, agrees wholeheartedly with Richard. Of KONY 2012 he says: “It is a slap in the face to so many of us who want to rise from the ashes of our tumultuous past and the noose of benevolent, paternalistic, aid-driven development memes.”
Indeed, in the rush to condescend to the central Africans who are “just not working hard enough” to get rid of Kony and his ilk and finally start improving their quality of life, what many overlook (or willfully ignore) is the already-visible progress that has been made thanks to the hard-earned grassroots efforts of central Africans themselves.
“Uganda was voted by Lonely Planet amongst the top destinations for 2012 but has this NGO just undone the potential for Uganda’s tourism?” asks Ida Horner, a Ugandan expat who remembers well a much harsher life under Idi Amin. “After all the tourism industry provides a real opportunity for Ugandans to work their way out of poverty through providing services that tourists want to consume.”
Nigerian-American novelist Teju Cole takes it a step further and slams what he calls the “White Savior Industrial Complex,” which cares little for the end, so long as it gets satisfaction from the means. “The white savior supports brutal policies in the morning, founds charities in the afternoon, and receives awards in the evening,” says Cole. “The White Savior Industrial Complex is not about justice. It is about having a big emotional experience that validates privilege.”
And all this before we’ve even touched on the dark heart of the matter: Joseph Kony.
Kony is, without a doubt, a despicable human being. His 25-year reign of terror has resulted in hundreds of deaths, thousands of abductions, and hundreds of thousands of displacements. But to suggest that Kony is anywhere near worthy of cheap, throwaway comparisons to such historical horror-mongers as Hitler is not only irresponsible, it might actually be what Kony wants.
IC’s video appears to suggest that Kony is currently in possession of over 30,000 child soldiers. According to the UN’s latest report, the LRA has “less than 500 combatants,” and was “dislodged” by Ugandan security forces in 2002 — meaning they are no longer there, and are unlikely to return.
Kony and the LRA are now but a horrible memory to many in northern Uganda who don’t need an Internet campaign to make Kony popular. They know all-too-well who he is and what he was once capable of, and are desperately trying — peacefully, through reconciliation — to move away from the shadows of their traumatic past.
“Now we have peace, people are back in their homes,” says Dr. Beatrice Mpora, who runs a community health organization in the rebels’ former northern Uganda stomping ground of Gulu. “They are planting their fields, they are starting their businesses. That is what people should help us with.”
That is not to say that Kony is entirely done away with; he is still able to menace remote areas in neighboring countries such as the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Central African Republic — his last known hideout. But rather than an ascending fuhrer, Kony is an aging monster, thrashing about blindly in hopes of remaining relevant for a little while longer.
Sadly, it seems IC’s KONY 2012 campaign may end up doing exactly what it aims to do: Provide a spent villain with a second wind of infamy.
“Most madmen love the idea of fame,” says Marc DuBois of Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders), “so Joseph Kony’s wet dream just came true.” By focusing all available attention on a bygone bogeyman whose days are numbered, the IC may be unwittingly rejuvenating the perception of Kony as an intimidating and influential force with a wider reach than his true resources allow.
“Making Kony ‘famous’ could make him stronger,” says well-respected Ugandan blogger Javie Ssozi. And that strength puts a lot of people in danger, including both locals and aid workers such as DuBois and colleague Avril Benoît. “MSF teams in LRA-affected regions of DR Congo, Central African Republic & South Sudan are likely wary of retaliation risks,” said Benoît.
IC, with its support for direct military intervention in Uganda, may not care that Uganda’s own government considers it “totally misleading to suggest that the war is still in Uganda,” but Kony does. To him, KONY 2012 represents a rebirth — a chance to restore a stifling grip that has been slipping for years.
So say KONY 2012 succeeds. America plants even more bootprints on the ground, smokes Kony out of his cave, and turns him over to the International Criminal Court. A job well done and stogies all around. Now there’s just the small matter of the fact that nothing has actually changed, because KONY 2012 doesn’t do a lick to address any of the big-picture problems currently facing central Africa.
All it has succeeded in doing is propping up Uganda’s war-crimes-perpetrating military and its brutal, corrupt, human-rights-abusing dictatorship, and strengthening the alliance of four-term-president Yoweri Museveni with his US counterpart at a time when a foothold in Uganda would be extremely advantageous to American oil interests.
Meanwhile, actual problems in need of actual solutions are being rendered inaudible by the beating of war drums.
Gulu, the Ugandan town ravaged by the LRA in a previous life is now home to the highest numbers of child prostitutes in Uganda, according to Ugandan journalist Angelo Izama. It also has unacceptably high rates of HIV/AIDS and hepatitis, even when compared to the rest of Africa. And the real bane of Ugandan children — the mysterious “Nodding Disease,” which has killed scores and debilitated hundreds — is no closer to a cure.
“Last year I went to Gulu, Uganda, where Invisible Children is based, and interviewed over 50 locals,” writes Columbia University student Amber Ha in an open letter to IC’s Jason Russell. “Every single person questioned Invisible Children’s legitimacy and intention.”
Adam Branch, a human rights advocate who has worked for years in northern Uganda, elaborates on what precisely has given so many people in the area pause:
The warmongering, the self-indulgence, the commercialization, the reductive and one-sided story they tell, their portrayal of Africans as helpless children in need of rescue by white Americans, and the fact that civilians in Uganda and central Africa may have to pay a steep price in their own lives so that a lot of young Americans can feel good about themselves, and a few can make good money.
By now it should be abundantly clear that KONY 2012 doesn’t offer a single enduring solution to any of the problems it pretends to want to fix. At the very least, it makes things worse. At the very most, it makes things much worse.
But beyond the reasons why lies a simple truth: Lasting change — the kind that makes people’s lives truly better — doesn’t come from awareness, or even from doing something: It comes from doing what needs to be done. And knowing what that is requires paying attention, listening to the victims, and understanding the whole story.
You’ll notice that I haven’t once mentioned money. There is plenty to say about IC’s accountability and transparency (or lack thereof) and the way it goes about spending the piles of cash it is making off KONY 2012 — and piles of cash are definitely being made considering the ubiquitous ”sold out” heraldic standards that popped up almost instantaneously next to the all-important “awareness swag” IC is hawking in conjunction with the video campaign — but that discussion is mostly moot.
IC is not a charity in the true sense of the word. It is a private interest group that allocates the overwhelming majority of its budget (nearly 70% in 2011) toward travel, compensation, administration, fundraising, making movies, and lobbying celebrities and congress [pdf] to support its central aim: Direct foreign military intervention in Africa.
Whether or not that is what IC should be spending its money on is a question best left to IC. The real question that you should be asking yourself is whether or not that is what you should be spending your money on.
It should be well-evident by now that KONY 2012 is a poorly thought-out and oversimplified campaign with shortsighted objectives that are detrimental to every relevant cause except making money. More than that, it is a campaign that is unwelcome by local civilians, politicians, experts, and humanitarian aid workers.
Asked about the video’s glossing over major aspects of regional history and culture, IC co-founder, and the star of KONY 2012, Jason Russell told the New York Times, “No one wants a boring documentary on Africa. Maybe we have to make it pop, and we have to make it cool. We view ourself as the Pixar of human rights stories.”
That’s great, except Africa is not a feel-good animated feature for the whole family. It is a real place with real people who would suffer real consequences if KONY 2012 succeeded in convincing well-meaning individuals that all it needs for a happy ending is to catch the “bad guy” with the help of American soldiers.
Africans deserve better than to be treated like two-dimensional Wacom sketches by a group of sensationalist jet-setters who — by their own admission — oversimplify the issues to sell their cause (and their bracelets). The people of Africa — nay, the people of everywhere — deserve real, long-lasting solutions; not quick-fix half-remedies that look good on Facebook.
There are plenty of ways to help without trampling all over self-determination. There are good, honest, transparent not-for-profits based in Africa that have been working for years to promote self-sufficiency through education, health services, rehabilitation, democracy-building initiatives, and myriad other programs that have resulted in empowering change. These organizations help the people help themselves without condescension or remote imperatives.
But don’t take my word for it: Do the research. Find a cause you support and make sure it is what it says it is, and, more importantly, that it helps the people it claims to help. Invisible Children and KONY 2012 do not meet that criterion, and for that reason, above all other reasons presented here and elsewhere, it should not be allowed to speak on their behalf.
[photo: scarlettlion.]
I wrote this long, nice, funny note, saying that I was just popping in to say hi to all of you tumblrinos and to tell you guys what I’ve been up to these past few months and what my plans for the future were and that I sorta miss writing here.
Then I clicked ‘Create Post’, but the only thing that got posted was the title.
So, I guess this is tumblrs way of saying “Fuck you Gus, we don’t need you here anymore”.
:)
Dear Tumblr:
I once was a man who was bored with Facebook. I thought to myself “Wow, this is kind of lame, no? Reading what everybody I’ve ever met had for lunch, or what sports team they hate, or what movies they kind of like, or who they’re dating… Its all so goddamn boring!” I had some things I wanted to just write, just to get it off of my chest and look at it. I couldn’t do it on Facebook, because everyone on Facebook knows me. To them, I am not person, or even a mind or a soul; I am a profile pic.
I asked my friends, rather casually, if men blogged. Everyone I know of who is a blogger happens to be female. I didn’t want to end up doing something that is mostly meant for girls (no sexism here, its more like, if I bought a pair of sunglasses and the guy doesn’t tell me that they are lady glasses and I end up getting made fun of). Eventually, I decided to stop talking and start doing. I decided I wanted to write.
I didn’t want to write on Facebook, because the “notes” section of Facebook isn’t very bloggish. Instead, I just arbitrarily chose Tumblr. Why Tumblr? Why not any of the literally millions of other blog sites? No reason. I had never even seen a Tumblr until the day I signed up. And so my blogging days were ahead of me.
…or so I thought. You see, Tumblr is a very fascinating site. It gives you the tools to create a rather intricate and organized blog. At my fingertips I have everything I need to write and upload pictures and post links, and I could use all of these things to create a wonderful, thought-provoking, poignant, riveting blog. Or, if I wanted to, I could use all of the tools that Tumblr offers and create a corny, tacky, unoriginal, thieving, re-blogged-to-death eyesore riddled with .gif files of cats and lame outdated pop culture references.
It seems that I chose the former, and so many other people chose the latter. Which, after much research, led me to a very scary conclusion:
Tumblr is the new MySpace.
Those who use it properly and tastefully are overshadowed by those who use it like a faux-trendy 15-year-old fat girl. And after a while, MySpace realized this and began to cater specifically to the idiots and retards who would do nothing more than post and repost lolcats. I am afraid that Tumblr may very soon suffer the same fate.
And so, with that all being said, I hereby resign from Tumblr and the Tumblr community. The few of you who followed me, I thank you. Most of you were worth following. I noticed that a few of you are from my home state, that’s neat, I suppose. Probably not 602, but nice nonetheless. Perhaps we will run into one another in real life, but I won’t hold my breath. Tumblr, for the most part, has been nice to me, although its not yet worthy of calling itself a community. Its more like an online High School Lunch Break. Yeah, I think that best sums up my time here.
I’m not going to delete my account, but I am not going to be writing here anymore. I’ll probably still end up checking it once in a while, you know, out of curiosity and boredom.
Sincerely,
Gus
…well, not really ‘Gus’…
…My name does start with a G, but whatever…
I, at one point or another, have attempted to be like 4 of these. All briefly, all unsuccessfully. I’m glad nothing stuck, but it did shape the man I am today.
Sometimes, this is what I see when I look in the mirror. Its funny how our minds can focus on and exaggerate our worst features.
![thedailywhat:
This Is All Kinds Of Wrong of the Day: Etsy spoof site Regretsy thought it was doing a fairly straightforwardly nice thing when it decided to accept donations from readers in order to fund presents for the less-fortunate children of other readers.
And it was!
Except, instead of using a PayPal “buy” button for the donations, it used the seemingly better-suited “donate” button, which is actually reserved for the exclusive use of nonprofit orgs. Regretsy is a for-profit site.
So what, right? Wrong: PayPal shut down Regretsy’s Christmas-for-Poor-Children fund, forcing it to return everyone’s money. Worse still, PayPal kept a portion of the transaction fees for themselves. I know!
Needless to say, the Internet is pissed.
What now? Says Regretsy’s Helen Killer: “I am very sorry to say that at this point, I am not able to make a monetary gift to the families. They have frozen everything that was not already spent or donated, and I have no more funds to make a gift of that size.”
tl;dr: PayPal canceled Christmas.
For those who want to read more, Green Geek Girl has a really long write-up on why PayPal is even more wrong than you think.
[regretsy.]
UPDATE: Following a massive outpouring of Internet rage, PayPal’s heart miraculously grew three sizes and it has agreed to release the funds donated by Regretsy readers.
“Just like anyone else, we believe strongly in helping those in need, especially around the holiday season,” writes PayPal Director of Communications Anuj Nayar in a blog post. “We are working with Regretsy to make a donation to help their cause, and we’re truly sorry this occurred.”](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lvsn8cHHWv1qzpwi0o1_1280.jpg)
This Is All Kinds Of Wrong of the Day: Etsy spoof site Regretsy thought it was doing a fairly straightforwardly nice thing when it decided to accept donations from readers in order to fund presents for the less-fortunate children of other readers.
And it was!
Except, instead of using a PayPal “buy” button for the donations, it used the seemingly better-suited “donate” button, which is actually reserved for the exclusive use of nonprofit orgs. Regretsy is a for-profit site.
So what, right? Wrong: PayPal shut down Regretsy’s Christmas-for-Poor-Children fund, forcing it to return everyone’s money. Worse still, PayPal kept a portion of the transaction fees for themselves. I know!
Needless to say, the Internet is pissed.
What now? Says Regretsy’s Helen Killer: “I am very sorry to say that at this point, I am not able to make a monetary gift to the families. They have frozen everything that was not already spent or donated, and I have no more funds to make a gift of that size.”
tl;dr: PayPal canceled Christmas.
For those who want to read more, Green Geek Girl has a really long write-up on why PayPal is even more wrong than you think.
[regretsy.]
UPDATE: Following a massive outpouring of Internet rage, PayPal’s heart miraculously grew three sizes and it has agreed to release the funds donated by Regretsy readers.
“Just like anyone else, we believe strongly in helping those in need, especially around the holiday season,” writes PayPal Director of Communications Anuj Nayar in a blog post. “We are working with Regretsy to make a donation to help their cause, and we’re truly sorry this occurred.”
James Rolfe and “Motherfucker” Mike Matei review “The Man Who Saved The World”, better known as TURKISH STAR WARS. Yeah. Looks like an awesome movie.
My best friend (who doesn’t even read my blog) keeps bugging me to write about her. And so I shall:
My bestest friend in the whole wide world is a young lady named, um, lets call her Ralph (that what it says on her sunglasses and I do sometimes call her that). Ralph is a kindhearted sweetie who makes me laugh. That’s saying quite a bit because usually girls don’t make me laugh, regardless of how funny they tell me they are. She is my best friend and I like her very much.
I went to high school with her. Back in those days, we weren’t exactly friends. I would try to talk to her from time to time but she would just look at me like I was stupid and brush me off. I would think to myself “Jeez, what a stuck up bitch”. You see, Ralph is an introvert. She was very shy back then. Even when we went to Japan on a school trip, I would constantly be shot down every time I tried to talk to her or hang out with her.
Then, after high school, one day I was driving around town and I saw her and her friend walking out of a supermarket. I drove through the parking lot and nearly ran her over. “Hey ladies, remember me? Gus, from high school. You guys need a lift?” She said okay, probably for fear that I would run her over if she had declined, and I gave them a lift. A few weeks later, Ralph called me. She still had my phone number from the Japan itinerary. We hung out a few times, and she started opening up to me. The more we spoke, the more I liked her and realized that she wasn’t a bitch at all. She was just really shy, and I was very obnoxious and came on too strong. Turns out, she and I were in the same second grade class together and I didn’t know. And I also found out that she didn’t dislike me, which was great. Me and her have been pretty much inseparable since.
Ralph and I hang out almost everyday. We go out to eat a lot, and on Fridays we go to the movies. Shes still a little shy, but that’s mostly because shes not a people person, much like myself. We can’t stand stupid people. But shes not as shy anymore because she is a hair stylist and her job requires her to shoot the shit with strangers.
That’s all. Ralph is my best friend and I like her very much. The end.
I wrote a post about my best friend a few hours ago. It was long and sweet and heartfelt, then when I clicked Create Post, instead of posting what I had written, it just posted the title with no body.
What the fuck? That’s bullcrap. Now I have to re-write it, and it wont be as nice as the original. Fuck you, tumblr.